Alternative uses for distortion explored, vintage compressors and todays ounterparts, Logic Pro, Reason 6 and Ableton Live Workshops, Metropolis engineer Sam Wheat interviewed, the latest reviews, industry news and more.
* ON THE DVD - 4GB of Content! *
Vintage Electric Keys (1.19GB)
This months pack from the samples masters at PinkNoise Studio features seven electric piano instruments with additional distorted patches to give a lo-fi, vintage vibe. The sounds have been hand -crafted using a Korg MicroX and Nord Modular G2X, plus some subtle processing courtesy of the Fairchild compressor, Neve 1081 EQ, Roland Dimension D and CE-1 Chorus UAD plug-ins. On the disc you ll find 24-bit/44.1 and 24-bit/96kHz versions, plus a number of ‘clean and ‘dirty patches for Kontakt and Reason. The dirty Reason patches combine the Combinator and the Scream 4 distortion module, and for those lucky enough to own the new Reason 6 there are bonus patches that utilise the new Pulveriser sound-crunching effect.
Tech House Construction Kits (164MB)
The bouncing sounds of tech house are proving massively popular in clubs around the globe as hungry clubbers search for the middle ground between house and
electro – and our friends at Equinox Sounds have put together four construction kits for producing tech house tracks. In each folder you ll find full-mix audio
plus component parts covering kick drums, percussion, deep basses and progressive synth riffs. Each folder is also labelled with tempo from 125 - 128BPM, although you can easily time-stretch these samples as they are provided in ACID WAV as well as Apple Loops formats.
Reason Instruments Explained (52 minutes)
All eyes are on Reason at the moment following the release of version 6, which has some tasty new features. One thing that remains the same, though, is Reason s solid collection of virtual synths, samplers and drum machines. The experts at Groove 3 have provided over 50 minutes of video taken from their Reason Instruments Explained Volumes 1 & 2 tutorials. Topics include an overview of the instruments, selecting and playing instruments, assigning controls, using patches, the Thor synth and using the effects in Kong. To view the videos in hi -res, download the files from the disc and click on the relevant ‘gPlayer .
Producting in Live, Cubase & Logic (44 minutes)
If you re after concise dance music production courses, check out Point Blank Online, who offer a range of four-week internet-based courses (on page 100 you ll find a competition to win a place on a Cubase, Logic or Ableton Live course of your choice). We ve got tasters from several Point Blank Online courses including the new Deep House Ableton Pro Producer course. There are six videos in total, covering the Novation Launchpad and creating a sample montage with Live, beat-analysis and the binaural panning plug-in in Logic, plus scale correction and vocal cutups in Cubase. Download the files from the disc to view all six videos in high resolution.
Prime Loops Taster Pack (180MB)
The prolific team at Prime Loops has put together a tasty selection of cutting -edge samples taken from seven of the companys latest releases. First up there are bouncing house beats and riffs with the Masters Of Funky House pack reviewed in this month s Mini Reviews. You ll also find massive sweeps and effects with Epic Build-Ups & Breakdowns, heavily effected robot voices with Hyper Vocals, jump-up dubstep beats, hits and synth stabs with Ravestep, plus an array of urban riffs and drum loops taken from the Southside Kings, Urban Ikonz and Urban Kandy packs.
